Australia's gun ban is much touted, because "gun deaths" dropped and mass shootings dropped. But I'd suggest that "gun deaths" is a silly measure. What matters is the homicide rate, right? Well in the years since Australia's gun ban, the United States has seen gun rights significantly strengthened. Take a quick look at this map. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/Rtc.gif Now again, I think looking at gun deaths is a silly measure. In a hypothetical, suppose we lived in a town where 5 people were killed a year by baseball bats and 10 killed a year by knives. Suppose we banned baseball bats and the next year we saw baseball bat deaths drop to 1, and stabbing (by knife) deaths jump to 15. We could say, "the bat death rate has fallen, these laws are working", but it seems kind of silly when its apparent that the actual number of homicides hadn't decreased. The true and obvious measure of an "___ control" law is homicides total as a rate. Well, interestingly enough, when we look at the homicide rate in Australia from 1996 to 2013, it fell 29.4%. Over that same period the U.S. homicide rate fell 39.2%, during a period where gun rights were significantly strengthened. http://www.aic.gov.au/dataTools/facts/vicViolentRate.html https://www.infoplease.com/us/crime/homicide-rate-1950-2014
We live in reality not hypothetical situations. The real rate is the number of people killded by guns, not baseball bats. That, Troianii, is all your fallacy of false equivalency. The law in Australia works. But, with our heritage, it won't here. But the legislature and SCOTUS can make certain types of weapons of mass firepower and their accessories illegal. By chasing then those weapons, we will start catching people who should not have them. Jailing them will cull the herd significantly.
When I lived in Texas, there was a guy selling a 50mm anti-aircraft gun. . . with shells. . .AT A GARAGE SALE!!! Can that be legal???. . . . What is the cutoff point???
The biggest issue I have with the narrative being spun is that it doesn't care about what's actually relevant. A few points: 1. Australia did not ban guns, we confiscated semi-automatic rifles. Any citizen can legally get a high calibre firearm up to 338 Lapua. Literally anyone. Even potential mass shooters, provided they don't have mental health issues which would disqualify them. To legal shooters such as myself this sucks, but to active shooters they're only somewhat hindered. They can only shoot 20 people a minute. 2. There are 3 things which are largely unique about America's gun laws: legal NFA licensed weapons, concealed carry, and the culture. Arguably only the latter has any relevance to this tragic event. 3. We give America **** on this issue because it makes us feel smugly superior. New Zealand has perfectly legal semi-automatic rifles for the public and practically no Australian knows this because it contradicts the narrative, especially when NZ hasn't had a mass shooting for 20 years either. 4. I'll say it again. America has a problem with HANDGUNS, not long arms! The vast, vast majority of gun crimes are perpetrated with illegal handguns. The majority of criminals value concealability above all else. The left targets long arms because they're emotionally driven, not driven by the facts. 5. The elephant in the room: no person with the will to commit a shooting spree decides not to because they can "only" shoot 20 people a minute. Correlation does not equal causation, and since the decline in gun crime was seen in comparable jurisdictions which didn't confiscate the property of law abiding citizens while lowering penalties for criminals, that is a strong indication that there indeed is a third causal factor. The prime motivation of Australians on this issue is that we love two things: 1. A good old fashioned yank bash. 2. Feeling smugly superior while doing nothing of substance.
